Outgoing US envoy to Syria James Jeffrey stated in a recent interview with Defense One that US officials have been "playing shell games" about the number of troops in the region to deceive the Trump administration into thinking there has been a military withdrawal. Here are some excerpts:
A message for Caitlin. I believe the use of the term "deep state" derives from the writings of Peter Dale Scott, who, long before it became common parlance, developed the term "deep politics" to refer to the policies devised and decided in the shadows, out of the reach of the governed and their consent. This includes covert operations, propaganda, secret social engineering projects, and more. And in many cases they are policies that continue unabated no matter who is in charge.
During the recent presidential "campaign" season, there was a Zoom meeting with Obama from some confined location, in which the former president said something very revealing. During his statement, Obama, in his usual articulate way, said that one of the main problems with Trump was that in foreign policy he was undoing, or trying to undo, many years of prior policy.
I found this to be a staggering statement, something which obviously never occurred to either Obama or the news stenographers in the studio. There are two major, damning takeaways from this statement:
1) Obama doesn't realize, or is pretending not to realize, that changing foreign policy is the legal constitutional prerogative of an incoming president; and
2) he is implying that he, Barack Obama, like the good CIA soldier he was groomed to be, chose to "stay the course" and NOT shift from Bush's disastrous, criminal, genocidal foreign policy, but indeed to expand it, DESPITE the fact that one of the principal reasons he, Obama, was elected--probably the biggest reason--was PRECISELY to change foreign policy and end the wars.
What we have witnessed, therefore, is a merging of the deep state with the visible state. It is a process that has probably been ongoing for a while, but it got its big kick with the Bush II presidency, when they implemented the PNAC plan and put the world on the fasttrack to hell that it's still on. Trump lay outside the "cone of silence" and therefore had to be excised. I'm no fan of Trump, but what is coming will be worse.
I wasn't aware that one of the whistleblowers, that anonymous NYT whistleblower, was a DOD person. Within the broader context of hiding US operations in foreign countries from the president, and the recent revelation, I'm increasingly unhopeful that foreign policy will change in the future.
Especially so with Joe "I wanted to invade Iraq before 9/11" Biden in charge and especially considering the potential top picks.
You write about very serious topics. Maybe that's why I thought the photo of the 2 brothers playing the video game and the 3rd unplugged was so funny and relevant.
That paragraph and controller analogy...wow, you captured it so succinctly. Spot on. Funny. Sad.
A message for Caitlin. I believe the use of the term "deep state" derives from the writings of Peter Dale Scott, who, long before it became common parlance, developed the term "deep politics" to refer to the policies devised and decided in the shadows, out of the reach of the governed and their consent. This includes covert operations, propaganda, secret social engineering projects, and more. And in many cases they are policies that continue unabated no matter who is in charge.
During the recent presidential "campaign" season, there was a Zoom meeting with Obama from some confined location, in which the former president said something very revealing. During his statement, Obama, in his usual articulate way, said that one of the main problems with Trump was that in foreign policy he was undoing, or trying to undo, many years of prior policy.
I found this to be a staggering statement, something which obviously never occurred to either Obama or the news stenographers in the studio. There are two major, damning takeaways from this statement:
1) Obama doesn't realize, or is pretending not to realize, that changing foreign policy is the legal constitutional prerogative of an incoming president; and
2) he is implying that he, Barack Obama, like the good CIA soldier he was groomed to be, chose to "stay the course" and NOT shift from Bush's disastrous, criminal, genocidal foreign policy, but indeed to expand it, DESPITE the fact that one of the principal reasons he, Obama, was elected--probably the biggest reason--was PRECISELY to change foreign policy and end the wars.
What we have witnessed, therefore, is a merging of the deep state with the visible state. It is a process that has probably been ongoing for a while, but it got its big kick with the Bush II presidency, when they implemented the PNAC plan and put the world on the fasttrack to hell that it's still on. Trump lay outside the "cone of silence" and therefore had to be excised. I'm no fan of Trump, but what is coming will be worse.
Just thank you!!!
"Not at who's president, but why things stay the same no matter who's president." Empirically true. Great piece!
Thank you for expounding more upon this story.
I wasn't aware that one of the whistleblowers, that anonymous NYT whistleblower, was a DOD person. Within the broader context of hiding US operations in foreign countries from the president, and the recent revelation, I'm increasingly unhopeful that foreign policy will change in the future.
Especially so with Joe "I wanted to invade Iraq before 9/11" Biden in charge and especially considering the potential top picks.
You write about very serious topics. Maybe that's why I thought the photo of the 2 brothers playing the video game and the 3rd unplugged was so funny and relevant.